Mindoir 2170
by V-rcingetorix
Summary: A look at the Mindoir Attack (Colony Origin)


Authors Note: _So this is an interesting site, and has a lot of intriguing ideas. Here is my little contribution. It goes without saying that Mass Effect is owned by TPTB (namely not me) and that the idea for this particular came at the inspiration of Drussius and Random Equinox. Thanks guys!_

**And so it begins…**

Mindoir is a Earth class planet with a medium sized human colony and populated by around 5,000 people. Smaller than Elysium, but larger than Feros, Mindoir has a close proximity to both the Attican Traverse and Alliance space. This makes it doubly useful, as Mindoir has an impressive agricultural community that can feed half of Earth, and at the same time serve as a waypoint for Alliance fleet maneuvers.

It also was the boyhood home for Shepard, the first Human Spectre, and survivor of the 2170 batarian assault.

* * *

August 5, 2170

0300 Mindoir Solar Time

Shepard woke to the sound of the pirate raid siren. Lights were going out all over the colony, standard procedure, albeit one with which his parents disagreed. Any enemy looking to pillage the colony would undoubtedly have marked all defensive turrets and light towers beforehand. Better to have maximum visibility for the grunts, while the defenders could use nightvision or thermal support ready. Enemies would most likely have the same equipment anyway.

Engines started up outside, transport vehicles readying to take their load to established safe zones. Shepard winced; engines were a large heat source; if the lights were going to be cut, than the least that could be done was trying for a modicum of stealth. Any decent satellite thermal imaging system could pick up a human heat signature with effort; an entire transport would stand out like an elcor at an asari Renaissance Fair.

All this time he was moving, just as his parents and quadrant leader showed him. He had a natural gift for it they said. One brief look at an area and he could navigate it blindfolded better than some people could with their eyes open. Shepard used that ability now to grab his carry sack and his rifle, a Volkov VIII. He was a top rated rifleman with the colony militia, and the winner of the colony Marksman competition, there was no way he would leave it behind.

Outside it had gone almost completely dark, the Skyllian Verge skyline streaked in points across the horizon. The housing domes for the colonists were all dark, with an occasional bobbing light flashing on and off to show where someone hadn't been paying attention to their nocturnal-raid training.

A sudden noise caused Shepard to spin and let the weight of his carry sack pull him lower, unfolding rifle at the ready. He whistled softly, imitating one of the local birds. A return whistle reassured his safety, at least for the immediate future.

Like ghosts, his parents faded into sight, both armed and carrying their emergency bags. His father smiled crookedly, "Ready for another adventure John?"

John Shepard snorted, half-smiling. He tilted his head to one side, "Take the bus?"

Nadia Shepard shook her head authoritatively. "Not on your life. Just because everyone else is running like a chicken with its head cut off-"

"Is no reason we should too." John and his father chorused in a whisper.

Nadia pursed her lips. "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone out there _isn't_ trying to get you."

Jim Shepard motioned for silence, but with good humor. "And right now, that is very good advice. We should move quiet, and fast."

John shifted his carry sack to both shoulders so he could hold his rifle with both hands. "I'll take point. I have the best nightvision. Towards the safe zones?"

His father pushed ahead, "No. That much noise means the safe zones are compromised, so we'll head west. I'm taking point because I have the most experience. Deal with it."

Around them the night was no longer silent. The sound of weapons fire came from not so far ahead to the east. It wasn't the usual small-arms fire either, this sounded like artillery being used.

Jim Shepard looked worried, "That sounds like ship guns, why are they using them on planetary targets? They don't need it for…"

Nadia cut through. "They're after slaves, not just stuff." She looked scared.

Jim looked mad. John felt a wavering mixture of fear and anger, the idea of slavery had become a repugnant bogeyman tale in Alliance space for well over a century. Some humans trafficked in it, but in the main, those humans were regarded as being repulsive reminders of a darker time. Even before the Freedom Declaration Act of 2150, slavery had been outlawed. Two years after the Mars Prothean Station was discovered, humans had exponentially increased their efforts to prepare for the inevitable discovery of non-human sentient beings. Slave owners and traffickers had been ruthlessly stamped out by the newly unified governments wherever such practices were found. Prothean boosted technology had helped a great deal; for one, gene identification had become far more cost effective, allowing the tracking of people across entire continents. Better scanners allowed remote scans of cargo, eliminating the primary transport methods of slavers and drug runners alike.

John gripped his Volkov tighter; it responded to him, unfolding to full extension. If any slaver came close he'd regret it. Or she, John wasn't certain how to tell the gender difference in batarians. Either way, death would come to them.

Jim checked his own rifle, a Helix VI. He'd been the Marksman title holder before John, and taught him everything he'd learned from decades of competitive shooting. Jim had no worries about his or his sons' ability to take down anything that moved. Nadia on the other hand….

A soft metallic sound came from the right; all three members of the Shepard family ducked for cover, John for a recycle bin, Jim and Nadia behind a berm. All three were aimed at the sound, slight clicking and whirring as Jims' rifle and Nadias' shotgun expanded for action.

Jim became aware of a soft hissing eastwards and swung to cover the flank. Down the street was a batarian in full combat armor. The batarians' communicator seemed to be malfunctioning, it was giving out static and the batarian was fumbling with it.

Nadia pushed his rifle down slowly; Jim thought a second, and nodded. No sense advertising their position if they were not ready to take on everything possible.

A flat, barking staccato broke out from across the street, and the batarian jerked to one side, hit. He dove for cover and slung his assault rifle around firing back blindly at the shadows from where the shot had come. A scream came from the vicinity where the first shot had been fired.

Jim looked down at John, who was staring hard across the street. Their neighbor's toddler, Talitha was pressed against a window, an expression of pure terror on her face. Her father was on the ground outside, a pistol lying next to him. His wife had a shotgun similar to Nadias' weapon, but obviously didn't know how to use it, for it wavered like a branch in a high breeze as she peeked around the doorframe. Obviously she was considering running to her husband's side as opposed to staying under cover.

Nadia tapped on her omnitool and triggered an EMP burst, an infrared laser allowing a static charge to pass between her arm and the batarians' own hardware. The batarian jerked from behind cover; just enough for Jims' rifle to roar out like an angry god. The batarians' head vanished in a violent mist, dropping the body limply.

Slowly backing away, John searched for better cover. He saw a pile of multi-colored decorative rocks behind a line of shrubbery, and eased towards it. His father saw him moving and alerted his mother. She nodded grimly and crouch-walked behind a silenced transport. One by one, they cautiously moved back along the street, trying to see through the shadows. Their neighbors home faded from sight, Talitha and her mother had disappeared, ignoring any signal to join the Shepards. There was no helping some people.

As John swiveled in a crouch to face up the street, he backed into something somewhat soft. Looking down he saw…

"Dad…" his voice broke.

Jim eased over quickly, hunching low. He cursed under his breath. "Damn it, they got the Larsons."

The horror at the situation suddenly overcame John and, he heaved. Bile burned at his throat, eyes stinging, he was only vaguely aware of his father holding his shoulder guiding him farther.

"It's all right son, keep it together."

John wiped his face with a handkerchief, and then dropped it. "How can it be okay? She was over seventy years old and they just killed her…."

His father tightened his grip more firmly. "I'm not saying that what happened is good, I'm saying that you will recover and have a chance to help make it better." Footsteps clattered over in a parallel side street, and Jim shoved his son deeper into a group of shrubs in the shadow of a storage building.

More batarians trotted through the avenue, laughing and talking in rough voices. It sounded harsh, hoarser than a human and as if the sentences were bitten off at the end. John knelt behind a shrub and pulled a bead on the lead batarian, a heavyset individual with armbands. The others in his group were treating him with deference, so he was obviously the leader. Before he could pull the trigger though, his father touched his arm. 'Never let emotion or impatience judge your timing for you." Then with what could only be described as a smirking tone, "Let your mother have the first shot."

John flicked his gaze over to where he'd just noticed his mother hiding, right in the center of the path the advancing batarians were using. She was ignoring everything except the oncoming slavers. Her shotgun was slowly rising as he watched, leveling at the two in front.

A grind of gravel told him his father had sighted in on one of the targets farther back, so he raised his rifle again to the ready position. He didn't need to check to see his father in the same position, left knee up, bracing left elbow, right foot digging into the dirt, finger on the trigger guard.

For a moment, it was a quiet scene. Moonlight shone softly on all of the participants, casting deep shadow over the two snipers and reflecting brightly on the cast-off Mako hull piece covering Nadia Shepard. The gunfire sounds from further away could have been the fireworks for a July 4th celebration. The deeper explosions could have been construction work going on through the night hours when the heavy equipment wasn't needed for the main colony proper. Then the peace ended.

Nadia triggered her EMP burst, shorting out the shields of the front rank and opened fire, her Avalanche IX imitating its namesake with gouts of flame. The front pair had no chance, stripped of their shields as they were. Accelerated rounds slammed into their body armor, ripping through it like tissue paper. One of them seemed to have had a grenade set to a hair sensor; it also must have been an incendiary because it went off with more fire and heat than John had ever felt before. He was over thirty feet away.

However, it worked both ways. Thirty feet, to a truly talented sniper, is comparable to a shoe hovering two inches over a poisonous insect.

Just as John was processing all this, his father opened fire. Even amongst the top sharpshooters of the Alliance he was a champion shot, used to hitting targets a fraction of this size at over ten times the distance. One of the rear guard fell, clutching his throat, or rather what was left of it. Behind that guard, another slaver was blown off his feet, a crater where his chest should have been, two targets in one shot.

John let his field of vision go unfocused, tracking movement. On instinct, he pulled a little further to his right, closer to his mother and fired. His shot connected with a leading batarians' skull, ending his brief extension on life.

The rest of the fight lasted minutes, but it felt like hours to young Shepard. Watch, track, fire. Check sides, scope the distance, watch, track, fire. Explosions rocked the ground near the fallen batarians, probably more grenades. John later learned that batarians usually carried incendiary grenades on raids for vandalism purposes, and the ease of ignition was probably a secondary effect from his mothers' EMP bursts. Whatever the reason, John Shepard was in a state of calm, working his thermal sink like a machine.

When the explosions died down, there were a dozen batarian bodies on the ground, and fire licking the dry grass at the edge of the road. No human bodies were there; these batarians must have been a scouting party.

John started when a huge hand clapped his back. It belonged to an equally large man, the colony's expert on mechanics, Heinrich Olsen. Vaguely, John became aware that the giant was shouting.

"That's the way! Show them bastards whos boss!"

Jim slapped Olsen, "Shut up Olsen, we have to move! Nadia! Are you all right?"

Shepards mother gave a hand signal, and circled the fire to approach the bodies. As she approached, one of the bodies suddenly jerked to life, whipping a knife out of hiding. The batarian moved too fast for her reaction, burying his knife into Nadias' leg. That was the last move he ever made; while he moved too fast for an initial reaction he could not move fast enough to avoid retaliation in the form of a point-blank shotgun blast to the spine.

John's father broke from cover as Nadia fell. "Nadia!" He gathered her in his arms checking her over. Blood was showing through her sturdy coverall, showing fast.

She grimaced, "I'll be fine. We just need to get some medgel."

Olsen hefted a heavy assault rifle slightly, "There's some back in the shed, but we can't go there. I just torched it over a bunch of those four-eyed devils."

John joined the small group. "There's some in my pack, hang on." A quick rummage and he withdrew a medpack, and applied it to his mother. She sighed in relief, as it took effect.

More shots, closer this time, forced the group to take cover. It seemed shots were being fired all over the colony. Orange light too, was becoming more prominent, flickering evilly against the low-hanging smoke. All of the power was off by now, even the generators were offline. Even by colony standards, the quiet was unnatural. The setting moon was only a vague yellow circle, showing through the harsh-smelling haze.

Olsen glared at the sky. "I managed to hit the emergency beacon, but I don't know if they'll get here in time. I didn't come all this way to be a slave to some-"

Jim, supporting his wife, didn't look at the smoke-filled sky "Even if we don't get help in time, we'll at least make the slavers pay for what they've done."

"I checked on the houses as I came."Olsen said. His normally cheerful voice voice was deep with sorrow. "Everyone that could get out is already out. Either they're hiding deep, or they headed to the safe zones. Most of them are on the other side of town. Residential section."

Movement flickered off to one side, Jim caught a glimpse. "We have to move, maybe outside of town. Nadia still has a few research cabins set up out there, and I know where the caches are…."

Olsen nodded. "Let's get outta here."

As most mobile, John scouted ahead. There were plenty of hiding places, easy if you knew the area and how to look. There were vantage points as well. By the time the small group reached the western edge of town, near the silent airfield, John had climbed to a higher point commanding a view of the entire eastern half of town. Even in the growing dawn, it was grim, smoke and fire all over. Worst of all, there were struggling groups of people slowly moving in the opposite direction. He couldn't resist, and used his scope to examine more closely. He immediately wished he hadn't, the groups were colonists resisting batarians, and not succeeding very well.

By the appearance of things, the batarians were using some sort of energy nets to cow the fighters, and forcibly dragging anyone who resisted. Batarian freighters, refitted with some form of anti-ship weaponry, and shuttles had landed on the far side of town...and from the more distant spirals of smoke, not even the farther farmsteads had escaped. Already the smaller craft were lifting off.

The streets near the eastern side of town were crowded with the dead and the living. John picked a target, centered on the helmet, and fired. And found another target, and fired. And again. And again. Not every shot was a killing shot, or even hit, but most were devastating in impact. Slaver after slaver fell, some with gaps in their backs, others were missing rather important regions of their cranium. Range didn't matter; some colonists actually being herded onto the slave ships were able to make a break for it because their handlers were forced to take cover. Some slavers fired back, but he was too far for them to actually do him any harm. Still, he wished he were invisible. He'd heard about some new tech the Alliance had that could do that, confuse the naked eye and sensors into thinking nothing was there. Still, when invisibility wasn't a viable option, distance granted a similar benefit.

Selecting and eliminating targets at range without a spotter was very engrossing, so much so that it took the flat sound of cracking pistols to distract him. When he looked down, his eye was drawn to a new line of smoke. Near it he saw a squad of batarians coming around a corner on the western edge of town, straight for his parents. Without thinking he switched targets, focused, and hit the leading batarian between his top pair of eyes. The squad stopped and broke for cover, but not in enough time to avoid having another of their number dropped by an increasingly furious Shepard.

Olsen and his parents must have heard the shots and seen their trajectory, for they redoubled their pace. When his father paused looking back, John waved for him to go on, and started climbing down. At the halfway point, a burst of gunfire erupted from the last place he'd seen his parents, but it was mixed with a chattering sound, like a series of hammers taking turns to pound an anvil.

Pushing his speed, John ran flat out. Growling sounds of ship engines grew in intensity behind him, but he couldn't stop, couldn't look back. Prefab buildings, identical in form and interior seemed to go on forever, no end in sight. Then the end was visible, a green line where the road turned and the town limits began.

As John broke into the open, he saw three things. The first was a shadow that belonged to an Alliance dropship. Marines crowded the hatches, but they didn't come. Anti-ship fire streaked from the east and struck the shuttle, blowing out a stabilizer. The shuttle went down somewhere to the south. It must have landed; John definitely heard something large crashing someone's home and it probably wasn't someone's pet elephant.

The second sight was of Heinrich Olsen. He knelt half-behind a boulder, Avenger assault rifle chattering away. Every few seconds, the big mechanic would raise his omni-tool and launch what looked like a modified welders burst combined with some kind of drone. The combined firepower was keeping back the squad of batarians.

The third sight was one that he would never forget. Both of his parents were behind the rock with Olsen, but both were down. Red stains showed obviously.

John stopped dead. A rushing noise filled his ears and the ground fell away…oddly enough his vision was clear, in a circular fashion, so there was only a little portion of the world visible, his parents. They looked still, peaceful. No.

For a moment, Shepard felt a brief twinge as something clipped his leg, throwing off his balance. He stumbled, dropping his carry sack. Intellectually he knew he was shot, maybe missing a limb for all he knew, but that it didn't matter. Once more he let his instincts take over but this time he focused, facts clicked through his mind. He knew that he was exposed, but conversely, so were the batarians. If he took shots from his position, they would move out of his LOS, which would move them into Olsens' range. If they tried to flank him by moving south-east, they would be traveling away from Olsen and his parents, while he could move north-west in turn.

Dropping to his stomach, he sighted in and stroked the trigger. Not good enough, that merely took down the shields. Several slavers stood for a better angle on Shepard as he rolled sideways over a clump of flowers (how dare something so pretty exist in a world of chaos?) and fired again. The roll had allowed his heat-sink to recover, and this time his aim was true. Fire engulfed the next in line, the batarian frantically beating at the flames, easy shot.

Suddenly, more gunfire, assault rifles, came from beyond the cornered batarians. Two fell immediately with a third one rolling out of the way to lob a grenade at Olsen and Shephards' parents…time seemed to slow.

Shepard automatically tracked the grenade. This was like one of those games he'd played with his father out in the woods long ago; each would toss increasingly smaller objects from random angles. Compared to the credit chits they'd worked down too…this was harder. And still moving, it wasn't stopping, the heartless chunk of machinery…

John gauged the speed, led it by an inch, and feathered the trigger.

The grenade spun off course detonating pointlessly in midair.

Back at the origin of the grenades trajectory, the last batarian fell, downed by unexpected fire from their far side. Olsen again.

Actually, not this time. Olsen was down as well now, an orange glow around his right arm indicating he might alive, but not enough to shoot anything.

John pivoted on one heel as heavily armored people broke cover from the woods, bristling with weaponry. Taking a moment he squinted down his sight to see a grim human looking back at him over the barrel of a shotgun. That was enough to convince him that the immediate area was safe, and the ground blurred under his feet.

John didn't remember putting away his rifle, although he must have since it was folded onto his back magplate. All he knew was that good people were dead, first the Larsons, then more and now his parents were….

Jim Shepard moved slightly. John knelt hurriedly checking vitals, digging out medgel, someone screaming for help. It took a minute before he realized that the only person in the vicinity capable of screaming was himself.

The next few minutes were confused. People running, shouting, someone was shaking him, tried to take his rifle. John struck instinctively, lashing out with a heel followed by a palm strike knocking the heavily armored soldier back. Hands grabbed at John but he pulled away, trying to hear something. His father was whispering but there was too much noise…it was too confusing…

Someone started bellowing to one side and a circle cleared around John and his parents, someone else dragged Olsen away, he was clearly dead. Then he could hear….

"John…we'll be fine.…" Life was clearly leaving Jims eyes, but he seemed to want to talk.

"Dad, don't talk. Save your strength-" John tried to calm his father, but Jim managed to grasp his hand. "Truth…most valuable…gift, man …can give. Mother…wanted to tell you…asked me to say she…loves you." Gasps for air stabbed between words. "Worst case scenario…message…check bags. We're….."A gasping rattle seemed to fill Jim Shepards chest. "Proud…of…you…."

There were several more rasping gasps, slower now, and then Jim Shepard breathed his last, eyes still locked onto the gaze of his son.

John held his breath for a heartbeat. Two. Then four. More.

Nothing happened. Gunfire still sounded behind him, one of the soldiers stamped, combat armor clicking against itself. No sudden epiphany, nothing imperceptibly different…which meant…this was real, not a nightmare. If this was real…grief had to wait.

Reaching over carefully, lovingly, he closed his father's eyes. Reaching farther over, he did the same for his mother. One more moment he allowed himself to mourn, pray. He was alone now, but maybe things would get better. One thing was for certain, there were still slavers, and he still had his gun.

Moving faster now, Shepard took his fathers rifle and folded it into his carry sack, and did the same for his mothers shotgun. He tied both of their satchels together, and combined them with his own. He would investigate what his father said at a later time.

Turning, he saw several soldiers in Alliance colors standing at a respectful distance. One of them had a Lieutenant's bars on his shoulder, so Shepard walked towards him.

The lieutenant noticed Shepards approach and awkwardly straightened. "I am sorry for your loss son." He seemed to wince, as if regretting his word choice. "Apologies, it is a bad time for this, but we need to know what was going on. If you would let us, we could also use your rifle. We're low on snipers, ours were heavily injured in the crash."

Shepard kept his voice emotionless, hiding pain until a more appropriate time. "Thank you for your sympathy, but there's never really a good time for this sort of thing."

The Lieutenant looked a little surprised. "Can you tell me what's going on here? I'm Lieutenant Zabaleta, by the way, of the SSV Einstein."

Shepard nodded. "John Shepard, of Mindoir. What's left of it. At 0300 hours this morning, persons unknown launched an attack on the colony. As per regulation, everyone turned out the lights and headed for the safe zones. My parents and I were headed away from the gunfire, we figured the safe zones were compromised." Memories surged, and he had to take a stabilizing breath; just like readying for a long-distance shot, in for a count of two, hold and exhale. "I got a look from a vantage point, and saw slavers on the east side. I took out a few of them," one of the soldiers snorted in disbelief, "But then I saw this group coming around the same side as my parents. I…couldn't get here in time. I think my dad managed to get one, and Olsen here kept the rest pinned until I got a sightline…we…"John took another steadying breath. "We got a few, but then you came in and took down the rest."

Lieutenant Zabaleta nodded thoughtfully. One of the other soldiers coughed meaningfully, "Sir, we are needed over there. Let's take the boys gun and go."

John let the soldier meet his eyes, making no aggressive moves, but letting the soldier see just how cold he could get. "With all due respect, I am not enlisted, and you cannot commandeer anything from civilians unless it is needed for survival or transportation. However, if you are trying to gain support against a known military threat, you can accept volunteers provided they are capable of defending themselves and are willing to help. Officers Training Manuel, chapter three, paragraph two, subsection B."

Lieutenant Zableta found it necessary to cough into his fist for several seconds. "He's got you there Sarge." He turned to Shepard, "Are you willing to help?"

Shepard pulled his fathers' rifle from his pack, and tossed to the rude soldier. "If you get a scratch on it, I will take an equal amount from your hide. Not your armor."

The sergeant reddened. "Some colonist kid can't just order-"

The lieutenant gave him a look, and the sergeant became quiet. The lieutenant then looked at Shepard. "Lead on."

Shepard spared one last look at his parents, and then turned back to town.

It was louder going in this time. Gunfire was constant, going off in multiple directions with much more rapidity than it had been on his way leaving town. Something odd was going on with that gunfire, but he couldn't tell what exactly it was. There was more light now as well, day had come in earnest, maybe that was the difference.

Shepard led the soldiers in a slow jog through town. He took all the shortcuts he knew. By the time they reached the east side, he knew they were too late. Bodies, batarian, colonist and Alliance soldier were lying all around. Too many colonists, too few batarians.

At the eastern edge, he saw Alliance military hiding behind buildings, rocks and whatever cover they could find. Occasionally some would stand or crouch to shoot around their cover, only to be driven back by a fusillade of enemy fire. Breaking into a run, Shepard started to charge, only to be caught by an armored glove. The sergeant jerked, bringing Shepard down.

"Down boy, can't you see they're pinned?" he growled.

Shepard wanted to protest, to claim he knew the terrain and wouldn't get hurt. But, thinking back to the armored Alliance bodies that lay around the town, he had to admit the sergeant had a point.

Then, he identified what was so odd about the sounds, it was screaming. It was a soul-rending sound made by people whom had lost all hope…and were being torn from the sudden reappearance of salvation.

Shepard peeked into the window of a prefab house. He gasped in horror, inside were people, but the people were in a barred cage. More people dangled lifelessly off of improvised surgery tables, made from kitchen tables, sofas, home made workbenches. All had severe head injuries; when Shepard looked more carefully, the people in the cages had wires that looked as if they were attached to their heads….

Shepard whipped a quick look around the corner of the house. More cages were being carried into the last of the freighters. People inside were gesticulating, pleading for rescue.

Before the sergeant could stop him, Shepard dove around the corner of the house and onto his stomach. His rifle was already waiting for him in his hand and he brought it up smoothly. Once, twice he feathered the trigger, then rolled swiftly behind a rock.

Return fire shredded the foliage where he had been. More ricocheted off the cover he was currently using. Shepard waited for it to dissipate, then swung around the boulder and took three shots, overloading his heat sink.

As he waited for it to cool off, he looked to his left, checking on the soldiers he had guided. The sergeant was taking shots in similar fashion to himself, select a target and eliminate it before the incoming fire turned a bad day into a dead day.

This time however, instead of the shots decreasing, they started increasing. That was unusual. Given the limitations of heat-sink hardware, the shots should have had a furious pace, then slacked off as the guns overheated and had to vent the excess heat. It was possible to override that safety, but at the risk of melting the ammunition block to the mass driver. At the rate the incoming fire was going, either there were far more slavers capable of wielding guns, or they were using new weapons that didn't need to cool off.

One more glance told him. Colonists were now armed, but instead of fighting their captors, they were laying down covering fire on their rescuers. Shepard doubted it was voluntary, they had a vacant expression on their faces, and the one colonist who resisted was writhing on the ground clutching his head.

One by one, the ships lifted off, escaping with their living cargo. Within an hour, the colony was silent again.

Lieutenant Zableta found Shepard on his family home, watching the wind ripple the nearby fields. He didn't respond to the soldiers presence at first, but turned when the Lieutenant sat on a nearby heat exchange. The two didn't need to say anything, at least for a while.

Eventually, the officer broke the silence. Pulling the stocky Helix VI from his backplate, he held it out towards Shepard. "Sergeant Ellison wanted you to have this back. Said to thank you for its use…and that he was sorry for being rude."

Shepard shifted a little. "He can keep it, so long as he keeps it pointed at slavers."

Zapleta chuckled slightly. "He said it would probably be better if you hung onto it. He's put in for a transfer to training soldiers. I authorized it, and put in a rec for his being promoted to Gunnery Chief."

Shepard took the rifle and looked at it. A slide popped out the anterior vent, showing a combination of still and moving images. At Zapletas' silent look, Shepard explained. "Guncam. All colonist weapons have one…just in case."

Zapleta nodded soberly. "Can I have a copy, for the records?"

Shepard waved his omnitool over his fathers gun, then waved it over his own. "You can have my records as well. As much data as you can get, take down the vermin if you can get them."

Zapleta held out his omnitool to receive the data. He stood to leave, hesitated then turned back. "Are you going to be all right?"

Shepard laughed humorlessly. "Yes. No. Maybe. I lost everything, not that we cared too much for anyone on this colony."

Zapleta sat down. "Why not?"

Shepard sighed. "Mom was a genetics research scientist. It was her job to evaluate the plants here, and determine if there was anything going wrong. Can't send hybrid weeds to Earth, look at what happened to Pragia. A lot of the farmers didn't like her 'poking around' their fields, even if it was for their own good." The young man sighed deeply. "I used to go on the rounds with her sometimes. We'd spend weeks out in the wilderness, just watching plants grow."

"Dad was more accepted around town, but even he wasn't that popular. All he had to do was recommend plans for the colony in case of emergencies, and watch the politics back on Earth. Not that anyone would listen. "He laughed hollowly. "The colony is dead. Not enough people to work the fields, looks like we'll lose more than five thousand acres worth of wheat. Maybe a few hundred acres of fruit trees, what's left after the batarians landed in the middle of the orchard district."

Zapleta's face softened. "Some of the colonists survived, thanks to your dads' planning. No one could have foreseen an attack like this."

Shepard refrained from sighing again. "Yeah. Some is better than none I guess."

"I also talked to the brass back on Earth. It looks like they're sending out a custom combine group to get the harvest in. Whatever they can get, they'll split with the survivors."

Shepard nodded slowly. "At least the all that labor we had this spring won't have gone to waste. All this food should be good for something."

Zapleta waited for a few minutes. "What will you do?"

Shepard looked over the fields again. Something beyond those fields was calling to him, he wasn't sure what. "I listened to some advice my parents gave me. They knew the risks of a colony world, and recorded messages from time to time, just in case."

He sighed, but not as heavily as before. "I'm going to stay here on Mindoir for a while. I have an idea about where I want to go and what I want to do, but I need time."

He turned to Zapleta with the first smile in days. "But I tell you this, where I'm going, no one is going to forget my family's name."

Lieutenant Zapleta considered the sixteen year-old. "You know, I think you're right." He finally returned. No one really knew what the future would hold after all.


End file.
